Chrysalis

[What do you see?]

[Much, prey. Dangerous.]

[Let me take a look.]

The vision was blurry, incomplete, but enough to show that the assessment was correct. They couldn’t go this way.

[Alright. Come back. Make sure you aren’t seen.]

Columbant withdrew her awareness from her distant pet, the small cavern in which she crouched snapping back into focus with disorienting clarity. Even after advancing the Skill to the second rank, it was still difficult to use, especially over a distance.

We can’t use that path, she thought to herself, which is going to severely limit our options. Are we cut off?

She consulted her tunnel map and began to plot out the routes still available to her. They’d ranged far from the meeting point, but there were still five days left before she was due to rendezvous with Magellant. She just hadn’t expected monster activity to be so high in this area.

[What do you think, Mistress? Shall we fight our way out?]

Her smartest pet, Rist, had long worked out how precarious their circumstances were. The flame demon had a good mind and a flair for fire magic, but was often too eager to engage, a tendency she had to be mindful of.

[It’s not ideal,] she confessed before she began to sketch out a rough version of her tunnel map on the floor with one leg. [We currently sit between two expanses that are unusually close together. This one is the shadow coral reef we explored earlier, this one we haven’t been into, but I suspect is a shadow swamp type. The spillover of monsters between the two is flooding the tunnels around us and causing the monsters to be higher tiers than I expected. If we try and fight our way out, we need to make it through these three junctions.]

She indicated the points where the tunnels met with an antenna while she continued to sketch with her leg. As she spoke, Rist watched with his ever-burning eyes, carefully taking in her words.

end up pulling more

said, a little disappointed. He hated

just too thick in the stone down here. It’s sapping the

strange draining sensation she’d felt before. They could still dig through, but it would take more than twice as long as

dig,] Rist said forcefully, [we dig

sacrifice them if needed to save her own life, but the core shaper would do everything possible to

it. I have a plan. Quietly train your Skills and wait for Slither to

nodded and gave her some space, retreating to the corner where he continued to practise his fire manipulation, twisting the flame into shapes and making them dance on his palm. Columbant skittered across to where her third pet

before reaching out with soothing energy. The beetle-beast groaned as the jagged wound across her flank began to seal over, bit by bit. A

girl?] Columbant

her head a little from her shell, letting her mistress see the determination in

[Ready,] she insisted.

[No, girl. Not yet.]

[Ready!]

felt a pain in her

some more food into

for another round of healing magic as well. Combined with a bit of Biomass, it

gained experience. You have received

Was Slither alright? She resisted the urge

to return, sighing with relief when he finally dropped down from the narrow opening above. A slug-variant of her own

Slither] Columbant said. [That will

Garg agreed, her gratitude rolling off her in

big beetle extended her jaws and in two quick chomps, the food was gone. Was it enough?